Virtualization

Jeremy is to hoping submit the business case by the end of this month.
The 2 in-house options compiled in the business case should allow us to revisit the SAN option (after the case is approved) and stay within the same budget (obviously sans flash storage). The phone system nudges the scale a little bit towards the SAN, but we could still do without. Anyway, in the interest of not disturbing the business case, this is a decision we can tackle once it gets OK'ed.

VoIP project

The 3CX Debian appliance is in Jim's old office, connected to a port on VLAN2 (Loomis). It's installed on your old desktop on the new Kingston SSD.

How their demo works is that it's basically a free-for-all for 30 days. I configured 5 channels and 3-4 DIDs.
A cancellation must be requested manually for our account to not enter the next billing cycle, at which point we would start getting charged.
ThinkTel rates are basically $30/channel, and $2.75/DID (includes v911 on that DID, $2.00 otherwise). Entering into a contract will likely lower the cost/channel.
According to ThinkTel, the difference between resold ThinkTel and direct ThinkTel is that with direct, we have a separate virtual trunk. With a resold line, it's Digitel that maintains a trunk (or lots of trunks) with ThinkTel, and we are basically assigned channels in that trunk. Shouldn't make a difference really.

The Yealink phone is set up, connected to a port on VLAN2. It is mapped to extension 900. Call quality and features are great, and this model is lower-end in that the T4x line.
3CX Flow Designer is the Windows tool used to design call flows. When compiled, the result is a "voice app", which you assign to a call queue (e.g. when a user arrives at a call queue either through a menu or dialing an extension mapped to a call queue, the app is "launched"). This will accomplish all the stuff we would ever want with advanced call routing.

Zultys is decent, but their desktop clienis ugly. They just released ZAC, which is their new desktop client and much nicer looking.

I recommended the Cisco Small Business line after reviewing the OfficeConnect line and concluding that it sucked. Just google the interface and you'll see what I mean. It all made sense when I found out OfficeConnect was re-branded 3Com.

The SG350-28P is what I recommended. It is a 28-port (24 PoE) switch with 195W total PoE budget. We don't need 48 ports; a situation where we run a separate cable everywhere there is a network device is just not realistic. 48-port all PoE is heavier, longer, louder, and more expensive. Also, I don't think we ever accounted for the dual ports on a typical IP phone (which actually acts more like a switch in that it can also do separate VLANs for each port). So considering all this, we'll be fine with a 28-port.
I did some network maintenance on the accounting switch. There were a few serious things (albeit they've been inconsequential to date) that needed to be addressed, like the Narc Psion AP acting as the STP root. This might not seem like a big deal.

Outbound ASW faxes have been fully migrated to Esker FoDC (Fax on Demand Connector), which are basically virtual adapters in VSIFax that point to Esker cloud fax endpoints.

The whole workflow when it comes to dealing with fax errors needs to be worked out and documented

Lucy maintenance was renewed for 1 year through CDW. This really didn't seem worth it for me, but considering it's still a good server with good parts that can be re-used even after Lucy gets virtualized, we figured we could benefit from continue maintenance. Clearly though, a 4-hour repair window still doesn't do you much when you're running a critical and RF and forms server on that machine.

Monitor upgrade was approved for the DC but I bought 2 to begin with for Simon, as a demo of sorts for the bigger purchase. I opted for something smaller 21.5" but still 1080p, and I wanted a height/tilt/swivel/pivot stand. Bought the HP vh22, but it's currently on backorder.

Sheila's old desktop is being used for Mike in HR. It was too good of a computer to leave sitting there - our other ones are garbage. I made a Windows system backup of the entire computer onto an external SSD but that's really just for peace of mind. Even when she did work for us after she left, I don't think she used this computer.

Purolator has set up their computers. The server is not the one in the cage but rather the one closest to the mail slots. We purchased 2 Symbol wand scanners as they did not provide any, but otherwise their computers are pretty straightforward. The rest of the stuff (Carrier Interface, input/output files) are still being worked on.

Angela's fax line was the only one remaining that was going out through analog (all other fax lines are being routed through the PBX out the PRI), so as an exercise, we got Digitel to move the physical wire from the analog demarc to the PRI, and I went through the motion of setting up an SLT. It was very smooth (including the porting of the DID from Telus). Angela's Xerox was programmed to prefix a 9, and it's been completely fine since the move.

There are 3 analog fax lines (2 previously used with VSIFax, and Angela's fax) that need to be canceled, but it was discovered that they're each under 5-year contracts that were renewed.